


Those We Keep

by VioletsAreNotBlue



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Sad oblivious idiots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-27
Updated: 2018-07-30
Packaged: 2019-04-28 16:32:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 11,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14453301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VioletsAreNotBlue/pseuds/VioletsAreNotBlue
Summary: Angry, humiliated, and exhausted, Ladybug risks her friendship with Chat Noir in a risky bid to expose Chloé's true nature.





	1. Chat Noir

**Author's Note:**

> I know they're setting up a Chloé redemption arc but I'm 10000% not emotionally prepared to forgive Chloé for any of the crap she's pulled so I wrote something bitter

It's been two years.

The day he became Chat Noir was the best day of Adrien's life. Finally, something that his father couldn't control. Finally, a chance to be completely free—free from his father, from his responsibilities, from his life as a famous face that everyone's seen plastered on billboards and magazines and the advertisements that plaster the walls of the metro. Two years of slipping away from his cold, restricted life and being free. Just him and his lady, running across the Parisian rooftops, battling evil, being called a hero—and at the end of the day, he can just walk away from being Chat Noir, and nobody is the wiser.

Two years of that, to the day, and finally, the shine is wearing off. Though, if he's honest with himself, the shine started to wear off a while ago.

Oh, there have been some good times. There have been strange, almost comical villains. But today's akuma victims hadn't been at all funny. There had been three in one day, for starters.

First there had been Cottonmouth. They hadn't even finished him off before a second akuma victim had appeared on the other side of town. Chat had had to rush off to distract the Mountain, a giant who had actually stomped buildings into dust, while Ladybug finished off Cottonmouth.

Just a few hours later, Matchstick had appeared. She had walked down the Champs Elysee with an enormous torch, setting buildings alight. If it hadn't been for Ladybug's Lucky Charm, Paris would have been incinerated. People would have died.

It had been too close. Every time feels like it's too close.

Chat sighs. He's sitting up at the very top of the Eiffel Tower. He should go home. He should get some sleep. He's got school tomorrow, and a shoot, and Chinese lessons, and homework, and patrol, and possibly an akuma attack.

But he's not ready to go home. He's never ready to go home.

A zipping sound cuts through the air. Chat smiles. He doesn't have to look down to know that Ladybug's on her way up. Maybe that's why he stays up here—he knows that, sooner or later, she'll appear.

Who's he kidding? That's the exact reason he stays up here. The only person who can find him up here is the person he always wants to see.

"Salut, chaton." A white paper bag is dropped into his lap as Ladybug settles down next to him. It's warm and has a few grease stains on it. MacDonald's—or, as Nino calls it, MacDo. He's cool like that.

"Merci, Mi Lady," Chat quips. Inside the bag is their usual order: two burgers, two things of fries, an apple pie, a milkshake. Two forks, two straws, four napkins. It's become something of a tradition. They used to get two milkshakes, but after two years, they're close enough to just get the one. They aren't dating close, sadly, but they're sharing-a-milkshake close. It's progress. Maybe.

"I brought you this, too." Ladybug holds out a tube of antiseptic gel. She's obviously already used it; the scratches on her freckled cheek are glittering in Paris's lights. Chat's got some on his arm. He's rolled up his ripped sleeve.

Chat takes off his gloves and accepts the tube. "Thanks, Bugaboo." She doesn't protest at the nickname. Again, progress.

They both know that all they have to do to heal themselves is detransform, but this isn't actually about healing themselves. It's about being cared for, being worried about. Who else is going to worry about them? To Paris, they're invincible. They have to be.

Chat smears the gel on his arm. It stings. "Rough day today, huh?"

Ladybug laughs bitterly as she stabs her straw against her leg, breaking the paper wrapper. "Yeah. Again."

"Nothing we can't handle, though, right?"

Another laugh. Just as bitter. "'Course."

Chat fishes a burger out of the bag and focuses on unwrapping it. He doesn't want to upset Ladybug, but at some point, they're going to have to address the elephant in the room. "Er…Mi Lady…"

She's busy sucking down the milkshake like her life depends on it, but she hums in response.

The burger is unwrapped. Chat focuses on it—the creases in the bun, the blob of ketchup threatening to escape. He's starving. He's tired. He's nervous.

"Chat?" Ladybug asks. The straw is still in the corner of her mouth, resting on the curve of her lip. Chat stares for exactly two seconds and then forces himself to meet her eyes.

"Is it just me," he says finally, "or are these attacks getting worse?"

Her eyes cloud. He feels terrible.

"It might just be me—" he starts, but she sets down the shake and cuts him off.

"No, you're right. They're getting worse. Hawkmoth is getting bolder. The victims are more frequent. The villains are more vicious. If things get worse, we won't be able to keep up." Ladybug heaves a sigh and stares out over Paris. The city is glittering and glorious. A stranger would never have guessed that it had been on fire only hours ago.

She's beautiful. Her hair has grown longer over the years, but she still wears it in the two pigtails that now rest on her shoulders, the ends curling slightly. Everything about her has grown longer and sharper, and Chat knows that he's longer and sharper, too. Hell, he's got stubble poking through his chin, but his father won't allow him to try to grow a beard. A patchy beard would look bad in the photos, and everyone's first beard is patchy. At least, that's what he's heard.

Chat takes a few bites of burger. "We can't keep going like this. Three in one day is too much, Mi Lady. Paris is getting edgy."

"I can't blame them."

"What should we do?"

Ladybug pulls the second burger from the bag and takes a thoughtful bite. "I've actually been thinking about that."

The fact that she doesn't elaborate troubles Chat. Sure, she can be cryptic at times. He still doesn't know her secret identity, and he usually doesn’t know what she's planning to do with her Lucky Charm.

But when they're not pressed for time, she usually doesn't keep things from him.

"Mi Lady?" he prompts, grabbing the milkshake and sticking the second straw in—deeper than hers, so they'll be able to tell them apart. He'd be happy to just use the one straw, but apparently they haven't reached that stage in their relationship.

"It's dangerous," Ladybug admits. "Tikki thinks it's a bad idea."

To Chat's memory, Tikki is a bit of a worrywart sometimes. He's never met the kwami, but he's heard stories. But maybe Tikki just seem like a worrywart because he's used to Plagg. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. She's not wrong, either. It's not a great plan, but…it's all I've got so far, you know?" The corners of her mouth droop.

Chat summons up every scrap of enthusiasm that he can muster. It's not a lot. "Well, hey! That's great!"

She looks doubtful. "Really?"

"Yeah! I mean, a mediocre plan is better than no plan, right? Besides, we're tough enough to pull off even the worst plan." Chat flexes. It gets a laugh. It's gratifying.

"Oh, you and your jokes." Ladybug swats at his shoulder. She looks a lot less stressed—in fact, she looks like she's forgotten the meaning of the word stressed. And that's why Chat makes all these silly jokes and shows off for her—because it makes her happy. He used to worry that she saw him as nothing but a jokey sidekick—all froth and bubble, with no substance—but after two years, he knows for sure that he's not just there to crack jokes and make Ladybug look good. He's her partner. She relies on him.

Chat stuffs a handful of fries in his mouth. "So, what's your mediocre plan, Mi Lady?"

"Um. Well…" Ladybug takes a long, thoughtful slurp of milkshake and turns her gaze back out to the glittering lights of Paris. "You know that little blonde brat who's responsible for, like, half of all akuma attacks? The one we've had to save over and over again, only to watch her piss off another person so much that they get akumatized?"

The night suddenly feels cold. "You mean Chloé Bourgeois?"


	2. Marinette

Marinette is not a bad person. She's not. She spends half her life saving Paris, and the other half lying to protect her loved ones. She's sweet, and she's kind, and she owns up to her mistakes.

But as she sits in class, side-eyeing Chloé from behind her textbook, even she has to admit that this little plan of hers is stone-cold. Stone-cold and petty, if she's honest.

Which she is. Because she's a good person.

Mostly.

She can't help wondering if Chat still thinks that Ladybug is a good person. He didn't seem all that excited. If anything, he looked…scared.

"Kidnap Chloé?" Chat's ears flatten in disbelief. "Mi Lady, you can't be serious."

Her lower lip juts out. "I told you it wasn't a good plan."

"No kidding." He shakes his head slowly. "Kidnapping is a crime."

"So is creating akuma victims. She's responsible for over half of them, Chat. 57%, to be exact. I did the math."

"That doesn't mean we should turn her into a victim, too. We're supposed to be the good guys here, Bugaboo."

It takes a lot of courage not to stare at her knees. "Chat, have you ever thought—has it ever occurred to you that maybe Hawkmoth isn't working alone? That maybe he has people who—who help him create akumas?"

He thinks she's insane. He so obviously thinks that she's out of her freakin' gourd. "Look, I know Chloé Bourgeois. She's not the nicest person, but she's not evil!" He waves his burger in the air to emphasize his point. A pickle goes flying into the night.

Ladybug sets down the milkshake and leans in. "Well, I know Chloé Bourgeois, too, and I know that she's petty and power-hungry and sometimes even cruel. I know that if Hawkmoth offered her power, or a chance at revenge, she'd jump at it."

Chat's shoulders hunch. "How long have you known her?"

"Years."

"Well, I've known her for years, too. And she's not evil."

Oh, she is, Ladybug thinks. She really is. Maybe not to hot boys like Adrien, or rock stars like Jagged Stone—but if she doesn't want something from you, she shows you exactly who she is. A bad apple, rotten to the core.

"And how would that even work?" Chat continues. He's starting to get genuinely angry now—a rare occurrence. Those big green eyes aren't very playful as he says, "Not only have we saved Chloé's butt a thousand times, but she's, like the biggest Ladybug stan on the planet. How the hell would you convince her that you were kidnapping her? How would you even intimidate her, even a little bit?"

It doesn’t go unnoticed that he says "you" and not "we." Ladybug's heart sinks a little. Chat Noir has gone along with every crazy scheme that she's produced for the past few years, usually with a wink and a nod and a stupid one-liner. He's never refused to back her up—but then again, she's never proposed something that wasn't innocent. A part of her wonders if, over the past two years, she's slowly grown into something that's not entirely innocent, either. Two years ago, she would never have considered hurting Chloé. Two years ago, she struggled to even stand up to Chloé. Now she's thinking about kidnapping her and forcing her to spit out the truth, and she's not even all that bothered by it.

Marinette sneaks another look at Chloé. She's filing her nails, confident that simpering little Sabrina will do her work for her. You'd think that after two years of putting up with Chloé's crap, Sabrina would grow a spine—but, no. Chloé's approval still means more to Sabrina than anything else, including her own dignity.

Three attacks in one day, Marinette reminds herself. You're not just doing this because Chloé is the literal worst. You're doing it because she's responsible for 57% of all the akuma attacks. Ever. The akuma problem is getting out of control, and if Chloé's working for Hawkmoth—

"What are you looking at?" Chloé suddenly shrills. "Miss Bustier! Marinette's staring at me instead of working!"

The whole class—the whole world, it feels like—stares at Marinette. There's a huge, awkward silence that goes on for days. She feels her entire head go red, from chin to hairline.

The terrible silence is finally broken, not by Miss Bustier (who just looks tired and exasperated, but who wouldn't after having to teach Chloé for two years?), but by Adrien. "You're not really working either, you know."

His voice is deeper these days, but still as quiet as ever. He's never been one to draw attention to himself—ironic and unfortunate, given his modeling career. Not that Marinette minds the fact that he's a model; it makes it easy to wallpaper her bedroom with photos of him. Yeah, she's a sad fangirl, but who isn't?

Having him stick up for her, however quietly, makes Marinette's stomach explode slightly. The rest of the class chuckles and turns back to their books.

Chloé narrows her eyes. "God, Marinette. If you weren't so obsessed with Adrien, I'd swear you were crushing on me, given how much you stare."

Nobody's looking back at their books anymore. Absolutely nobody. Not even Adrien.

God, why wouldn't he stare? Chloé basically just announced that Marinette is stupidly crazy about Adrien and has been for years.

"Shut up, Chloé," Alya snaps, but it's obvious that Chloé's arrow hit its mark. Marinette can feel herself going redder and redder. Her tongue seems to swell up. It won't let her speak. She's just stammering as her face goes purple and the whole class stares.

"I know about all those pictures you keep in your room," Chloé continues. God, why is her voice so loud? How is it possible for a human voice to carry across a classroom like that? "Sabrina told me all about that stupid shrine you've got. She said that you, like, ripped out every picture of Adrien from every fashion mag you could find and just taped it up on your walls. It's pathetic."

It is pathetic. Marinette's always known it was pathetic. Alya's told her it's pathetic on multiple occasions, but when Alya says it, it sounds affectionate. It sounds like Alya thinks her friend is cute and a little psychotic. It doesn't sound like Alya sees Marinette for what she really is.

"It's true," Sabrina pipes up. She's got the same ugly little smirk on that Chloé does, but her eyes are begging for validation, the way they always are. "All four walls. There were even some on the ceiling."

Oh, god, why did Marinette decide to sit behind Adrien again? Oh, right, so she could stare at the back of his head. Not so he could turn around, and she'd suddenly be totally unable to escape his gaze. His eyes are so green, and you'd think that wouldn't surprise her anymore, but it gets her every damn time.

The mutters are rippling through the little classroom now. There are tears pricking at Marinette's eyes and throat. Her hands are shaking. She can't cry, she can't cry, she can't cry—

"What is wrong with you?" Nino suddenly bursts out, so loudly that everyone jumps.

"What's wrong with me?" Chloé repeats scornfully. "I think you should be asking, what's wrong with her?" She stabs the nail file in Marinette's general direction.

Marinette breaks. She leaps out of her desk and flees the classroom. Chloé's laughing her ass off as she goes.

As soon as she's out of sight, Marinette allows herself to burst into tears.

Tikki rushes out of Marinette's purse. "Don't let her get to you, Marinette! She's just a bully!"

Marinette wishes that were the case, but Chloé's not just a bully. She's the bully. She's the reason that every kid in the class has, at some point, dreaded coming to school. She's a bully raised by a different kind of bully. Her father gets his way by throwing his weight around, and his daughter sabotages and manipulates and lies. They use their money and influence to make everyone around them feel smaller than an ant.

There's no doubt in Marinette's mind now: She's got to find out if Chloé is working for Hawkmoth. And if Chat doesn't want to help her, then she'll have to do it by herself.  
 


	3. Chat Noir

It's been an action-packed day, but that's the way all of Adrien's days are, so he's not that tired. If anything, by the time he's slogged his way through all of his lessons and photoshoots, he's more wired than ever. Being in photoshoots made him think about what Chloé had said about Marinette. Though, to be honest, he's pretty sure that literally anything would make him think about what Chloé had said about Marinette.

She'd sidled up to him after class and assured him that it was no big deal, but Adrien was pretty sure that it had been a big deal to Marinette. No matter how much Chloé flicked her long blonde hair around and batted her false eyelashes (yeah, he knows she wears false eyelashes—he's spent way too much time around models not to recognize them when he sees them), Adrien was sure that it had been a big stinking deal—to Marinette, to Alya, to Nino, and even…yeah, even to him.

Look, he's not stupid. He knows that Chloé's not all sweetness and light. He knows. He's known that since his first day at school, when everyone smiled at him until they found out that he was friends with Chloé. Their smiles had gone cold—or worse, vanished altogether. Their tones had soured. Their eyes had lost interest. And he hadn't known why. He hadn't known what he'd done wrong.

What he'd done wrong was, he'd been friends with Chloé. And she'd been all too happy to let everyone know that "Adrichou" was her friend.

(What's up with that stupid nickname, anyways? He's never liked it, but he's never had the heart to tell her that.)

So anyways, he knows that Chloé's not the greatest. And he knows that most of the kids in class don't get along with her. But she isn't be all bad. She's been his friend forever. She knows what it's like to lose your mom. She's always nice to him, and to his father, and she clearly loves her dad, and that's all got to count for something, right?

He tries to tell himself that, but it's not working, so he transforms into Chat Noir and goes to find someone whom he knows will give him some good advice.

He knows the route to Marinette's place by heart. About a year ago, he started hanging out with her. He was curious, okay? She seemed nice, but whenever they were at school, she was just so…random. She was almost weird. He didn't know why.

(Okay, maybe he did know why, but unfortunately, his heart has belonged to another for two years now. Why he can't seem to stop loving Ladybug, he doesn't know.)

(Okay, maybe he does.)

Anyways, it's nice to hang out with Marinette as Chat Noir, because she's pretty smart and funny if you can catch her when she's not babbling.

It's with a thump that he lands on the balcony atop the Dupain-Cheng bakery. The curtains are half-drawn; through them, he can see that Marinette's bent over her sewing machine, working on some glittery black and purple thing.

He hides the gift he's brought behind his back and knocks on the glass door twice. Just a simple tap, tap. That's how she'll know it's him.

After a long moment—much longer than normal—Marinette lets him in. Her eyes are still kind of red. She must have cried a lot, and more than once.

Chat wishes he could comfort her, but he can't do that without having to explain why he knows what's bothering her, so instead he cocks his head and says, "Why, Purrincess, what's the matter? Is your—" he waves at the heap of fabric on her sewing table, "—thing not going well?" 

She scowls. "Don't 'Princess' me, I'm not in the mood. And as for that 'thing,' it's for the design contest that Gabriel Agreste is holding. The theme is 'dark fairy tale.'"

Chat ignores all references to Gabriel Agreste on principle. "Not in the mood to be treated like royalty? That's a shame, I was prepared to spoil you rotten." 

With a flourish, he reveals what he's been hiding behind his back: some pink roses that he filched from one of the photoshoots. They were just going to throw the flowers out, and he'd thought, why not send some of them off to a better home?

Marinette isn't exactly swept off her feet, but she does give him a weak smile. "Gee, thanks, Chat."

"The Internet says that pink roses are for friendship," Chat says, leaning in the doorframe. He has no idea if it's true or not, but what really matters is that Marinette is sniffing the flowers and looking marginally better. It feels good to give her something in her time of need, especially since she's been so generous in the past. Nobody else would think to give Adrien Agreste homemade hats and scarves; they'd think, "Oh, he's rich enough to buy whatever he wants." But money can't buy friends, and it certainly can't buy friends who make you stuff just to be kind.

"Thanks," Marinette says again. "Hang on, let me go put these in some water. I'll be right back."

She disappears through the trapdoor, leaving Chat to look around her very pink, very Adrien-y room. He was shocked the first time he'd seen it. Anyone would have been. You don't usually drop into a stranger's house expecting to see the walls plastered with pictures of yourself.

It had certainly explained Marinette's weird stammering and clumsiness and blushing. Chat would judge, but, well, it's not like he doesn't have a gazillion pictures of Ladybug that he's saved from newspapers and magazines and the Ladyblog. Everyone's got someone, or something, that they're obsessed with, right?

And, in a way, it's kind of cute. Adrien doesn't like photoshoots or modelling, doesn’t like having all eyes on him all the time, but it's obvious that Marinette treasures the pictures. And if they make her happy, they can't be all bad.

Can't be all bad. Crap. He's back to thinking about Chloé again.

"Minou?" Marinette's poked her head back through the trapdoor. She's watching him with those huge blue eyes. "Are you okay?"

"I—yeah. I was just thinking."

Marinette clambers back into her bedroom. She's got the flowers in a plastic vase with little hand-painted polka dots on it. "It was really nice of you to bring me these. I had such a horrible day."

"What happened?" Chat asks, settling onto the rug.

Marinette sets the vase down on her desk and fusses with the flowers for a minute, arranging them and fluffing the petals. "Um…you know how I have a monster crush on Adrien Agreste?"

Chat waves a hand at the entire room. Oh, god, there's a shirtless picture of him half-hidden behind the computer.

Marinette blushes. "Yeah, okay, I guess it's pretty obvious."

"Oh, I don't know. It took me a while to catch on." He's speaking as Adrien, of course, but she doesn’t need to know that. In fact, it's better if she doesn't.

"Sure it did," she drawls, throwing herself into her desk chair. "Well, basically, the meanest girl in the history of mean girls told everybody about my stupid crush during study hall today." She pauses. "Adrien sits right in front of me." Another pause. "She knew about all the pictures on the walls."

Chat can still hear Chloé saying all those horrible things while poor Marinette floundered. He wishes he'd spoken up. He should have said something. But he just…couldn't. He's never been brave like Nino or Alya or Marinette. They all call Chloé out when she's being horrible. He's so desperate to preserve their friendship, if it can even be called that anymore, that he just makes a pointed joke and hopes she'll get it.

It's the coward's way out.

"That sounds awful," he says honestly. "I can't believe she would do that." It was awful. He can't believe she would do that.

Marinette laughs roughly. "If you knew her, you'd believe it. She's just the worst."

"She's got to have some good points," Chat ventures, but Marinette shakes her head.

"No. There's nothing good in her. She's only nice to you if she wants something—and usually, all she wants is to trample all over everyone else. She's just the worst." Her voice is shaking with anger. "She always has been and she always will be. There's just nothing inside her."

Chat doesn't know what to say. He clears his throat. "Um…you know, Princess, I…I've got a friend like that. Someone who's not very good at being around other people. She lost her mother at a young age, and she didn't have very many friends growing up. And now she doesn’t really know how to be around people her own age, so she says a lot of dumb stuff that she doesn't really mean."

This is what he should have said six hours ago. It's what he would have said, if everyone wouldn’t have looked at him like he was stupid.

Marinette softens visibly. "Oh, that's too bad. I used to be really shy, too. I know how hard it is to make friends."

"Yeah, I think she's trying, but she just doesn’t know how to connect with people." Chat's starting to feel hopeful. If Marinette can feel sorry for Chloé when she doesn't know it's Chloé, then maybe—

"Well, if she's trying, then she's not like Chloé at all." Marinette snorts and spins back and forth in her chair. "Chloé's never tried to be nice to anyone, ever."

"You don't know that—"

"Yeah, I do." Marinette gives him a sharp look. "Look, I'm not in the mood to be told that I should feel sorry for Chloé or be nice to her. I've already heard that crap, and let me tell you, if she deserved to be felt sorry for, or even be liked, she would have done one nice thing for one single person just once in her life."

She did something nice for Adrien Agreste, Chat wants to tell her, years ago, after his mom had disappeared and he needed someone who understood what that's like. But he can't say that, because again, he'd have to explain why. Sometimes, he's really tempted to just detransform and let Marinette see who he really is under the mask.

But then she'd probably seize up and go all crush-y, and he'd lose a good friend.

Good friend. Crap. Is Chloé a good friend? He's not sure he knows anymore.

Marinette's still ranting. "I know her mom died, and that's sad and everything, but it's no excuse for being a bully. She's mean to literally everyone, Chat. Literally. Everyone. Except Adrien, but that's just because she wants him to be her boyfriend."

Chat's jerked back to the present. "What?"

She snorts. "Yeah, apparently they've been 'friends'—" she makes little air quotes around the word, which is annoying and also pretty hurtful, "—since they were little kids. And apparently, that makes it okay for Chloé to call dibs on him."

Nino always tells Adrien that he's clueless about girls, but Adrien didn't think he was this clueless. "She called…dibs?" That's such a weird thought. How do you call dibs on a person? You can't just reserve a person for yourself like you're putting a book on hold at the library. You can't decide that you're going to like someone, so no one else is allowed to.

"Yeah." Marinette rolls her eyes. "On his first day at school, she ran around telling all the girls not to talk to him or she'd make our lives hell. He probably thought we were all super mean, but most of us were just scared that she'd embarrass us."

"That's…not that great a thing to do." He remembers that sinking feeling as he walked through the hallways and every girl looked away from him. It had sucked. Big-time.

Had Chloé known how much that would hurt him?

"And of course, because he was Chloé's friend, we all thought he was going to be a major jerk, too." Marinette's starting to ramble now, swinging back and forth in her chair and waving her hands around. "Then it turns out that he's really nice, but also pretty clueless because he's never had a chance to make friends before and the only influence he's ever had is Chloé, so of course he's not gonna be good at making friends. But then he started hanging out with Nino and he got a lot better. Your shy friend should hang out with Adrien. I bet he'd be able to help her make friends."

Oh, the irony. It's killing Chat. It is literally killing him. He's going to keel over and die surrounded by hundreds of pictures of himself, some of which do not involve shirts.

"See, that's the difference between Adrien and Chloé. Adrien didn't know how to make friends but he really wanted to, and he did his best to be nice. Chloé doesn’t want friends. She wants subordinates. You know, part of me thinks that she doesn't even want a boyfriend, not really. She just wants Adrien on her arm so she can lord it over all of Paris that she's dating Adrien Agreste. I bet she wouldn't even be nice to him," she adds moodily. "I bet she'd just dump him the minute some hotter, richer guy came along."

That can't be true. They've known each other since they were kids. Chloé wouldn't do that.

Would she?

"She doesn't just like him because he's rich, though," Chat offers awkwardly. He hopes he doesn't sound too desperate. "She probably likes him because he's nice—"

"If she liked people because they were nice, she'd like everyone in our class. We're all nice, except for her. What we aren't is hot and rich."

Chat's pretty sure that last part isn't totally true. Okay, so none of the other kids are rich, but saying they're not hot is like saying that Chloé has a bit of an attitude problem sometimes. Chat's pretty sure that he can name one hot thing about every single person in his class. Kim? Giant muscles. Juleka? Amazing hair. Nino? Rich, rumbling voice. Alya? Curves for days.

Maybe they're not models, but they're all some degree of hot. Even Marinette, who still wears pigtails. They drape onto her shoulders these days, curling slightly at the ends.

Again, he wishes he could say that. Again, he can't. This secret identity thing is such a pain.

There's an awkward silence.

"Sorry," Marinette says suddenly. "I shouldn't be unloading all my problems on you."

It's a good thing that Chat's had years of practice of forcing a smile. Fake smiles are almost natural to him nowadays. "Oh, don't be sorry, Purrincess. That's what friends are for, right?"


	4. Marinette

"I really think this is a bad idea, Marinette," Tikki says, for the umpteenth time. "I know Chloé embarrassed you yesterday, but—"

"But nothing, Tikki." Marinette shoves some cookies in her backpack and shoulders it. She knows this is a bad idea, but the thing is, she doesn't care anymore. She's been pulling Chloé's sorry ass out of the fire for two years now, and what difference has it made? Chloé hasn't learned. Chloé hasn't changed her ways. Chloé's just kept on being horrible to everyone, confident that Ladybug will appear in the nick of time and save her.

Not this time.

Her mother's voice drifts up from below the floor. "Marinette, you're going to be late for school!"

"I'm leaving now, Maman!"

Tikki's wringing her tiny hands. "Marinette, think about what Chat Noir will say. He's your partner, and if he doesn’t want to do this, then you should respect that."

"Chat Noir isn't going to find out," Marinette replies. "Miss Bourgeois and I are just going to have a little chat, and she'll be back at school torturing everyone before anyone misses her."

"I don't know, Marinette—I really think this is a bad idea—"

"Tikki, transformez-moi."

Tikki can't refuse a direct order, no matter how much she wants to. She's sucked into the Miraculous earrings, still squeaking protests. A hundred thousand volts of bubbly pink magic jolt through Marinette. She used to be afraid of transforming into Ladybug. It's no easy thing, having your whole body wrung out and filled up again with ancient magic.

But, oh, it's worth it. Ladybug knows it's worth it ever time she finishes transforming and feels power and confidence flowing through every vein in her skinny body. Marinette may be sweet, kind, and creative, but Ladybug straight-up kicks ass. And some days, kickassery is more important than sweetness and kindness.

Ladybug snatches her costume off her sewing table. It's a work of art that took all night to complete—a stretchy, shimmery, black-and-purple suit with big purple feather epaulettes and giant plastic diamonds shaped like a broken heart. Chat will have caught a glimpse of it last night, but he saw it when she was just cutting out the fabric. There's no way he'll know it's her, even if he does find out what she's up to.

Which he won't, because Ladybug's got an airtight plan: she'll nab Chloé before she even enters the school building. One or two kids will see her, but by the time the news has travelled to Chat Noir, Ladybug will be done with Chloé.

She used to mind that Chat was always late to the party; now, she's banking on it. But why would he change his habits after two years?

Ladybug slips on her matching mask and pops a purple case with more broken hearts over her yo-yo. A little dark lipstick; a wicked look in her eye. One look in the mirror is all Ladybug needs to convince herself that she looks like an akuma attack victim.

All she needs now is Chloé, dead or alive. Well, alive would be preferable, but…let's just say that if Chloé happened to finally drop dead from sheer meanness, Ladybug wouldn't be too broken up about it.

Tikki would be shocked to hear that, but Tikki can't read minds, and she can't stop Ladybug from throwing her yo-yo out into the Parisian rooftops and zipping away off the balcony before Mrs. Dupain-Cheng has a chance to check if her daughter's slept through her alarm again.


	5. Adrien

She catches him as soon as he's out of the limo. "Adrichou!"

Adrien grimaces as Chloé throws her arms around his neck and hangs on like she's drowning and he's a life raft. "Salut, Chloé."

"You ran off after school yesterday," Chloé pouts. "I hardly got to see you!"

She wanted to see me, Adrien thinks as he tries to walk towards the building. Not because there was anything to gain, but because she's my friend. Marinette's words from last night have been rattling around in his brain for hours. He almost feels paranoid.

She just said all those things about Chloé because Chloé embarrassed her. That's got to be it. Right?

"Can you believe all the homework we got?" Chloé finally stops hugging him. "It's absolutely ridiculous. I can't believe we're expected to do that much work."

Of course, it's right then that Sabrina runs up and hands Chloé a sheaf of papers and a latte, sputtering about how she was up all night finishing her assignments and Chloé's.

Chloé just glares at her and snatches both the homework and the coffee. "Well, I'd better get a good grade, otherwise we're not friends anymore." She sips the coffee and wrinkles her nose. "Sabrinaaa! I've told you a million times, I only drink fat-free lattes! This is full-fat milk!"

"Sorry," Sabrina stammers. She tries to take the latte back, but Chloé marches over to the garbage bin and throws it away.

"Just do better next time," she sniffs, waving her hand at Sabrina in an obvious dismissal.

The fact that Sabrina just nods and leaves makes Adrien feel really uncomfortable. Chloé's being so mean to her; why does she keep taking it, after all these years?

And why is Chloé like that to her best friend, but not to her oldest friend? What makes Adrien different?

Marinette's words keep haunting him: If she liked people because they were nice, she'd like everyone in our class. We're all nice, except for her. What we aren't is hot and rich.

Adrien knows that he is, objectively, hot and rich. He's a freaking model, for god's sake; you have to be hot to be a model. And he's definitely got some money in his bank account. But that can't be all there is to him in Chloé's eyes.

Can there?

"God, she's so useless." Chloé sashays back over to him. All her gold jewelry sparkles in the morning sunlight. "What kind of friend gets a stupid latte order wrong?"

"Probably the kind who was up all night," Adrien mumbles.

"Whatever. No real friend would try to make their best friend fat."

"I don't think that's what—"

Chloé's eyes flick behind him, and suddenly, she loops her arm around him and pulls him in close. "Oh, Adrichou, you're so funny!" She laughs hysterically—and loudly. Every single head turns to look at them.

Adrien might still be a little socially awkward, but he knows he hasn't made a joke. He sees that Chloé's looking over his shoulder, giving someone the evil eye.

He looks and sees three girls staring at them. They've got round faces and even rounder eyes—kids who've just started at collège and aren't used to rubbing shoulders with the likes of Chloé Bourgeois and Adrien Agreste. Their confused-yet-awed faces say it all.

It suddenly occurs to Adrien that, to these kids, it probably looks like Chloé's his girlfriend. She's hanging off his arm, after all, and claiming that he's funny.

He tries to pull his arm away when—all of a sudden—Chloé disappears. One minute she's there, glaring at some little kids, and the next—poof. Gone.

Adrien looks up just in time to see a screaming Chloé get hauled onto the roof by what has to be an akumatized person. He doesn't get a good look—just a dark blur, a flash of glitter, and…pigtails. The akuma victim has two long black pigtails bouncing around her face as she tucks Chloé under her arm and runs off across the Parisian rooftops.

Swearing doesn't fit the golden-boy persona that his father has worked so hard to create for Adrien. He does it anyways and runs off to find a place to transform. Looks like he'll be late to class again.


	6. Ladybug

It doesn't fit her image—like, at all—but Ladybug's got to admit that it's pretty fun to kidnap Chloé and hang her upside-down from the rafters of an old attic that hasn't yet been transformed into a chic little apartment. Not the kind of fun she usually indulges in—this kind of fun is dark and destructive. Ladybug can taste the danger in the air. She's got a limited window of time in which to work.

Somehow, that just adds to the fun.

Chloé's screaming and struggling. Her face is all red from hanging upside-down. "This is ridiculous! Completely ridiculous! Do you know who my father is?"

"Your father is Mayor Bourgeois," Ladybug says calmly. She walks right up to Chloé and stares her nemesis down. The little brat isn't nearly so scary when she's upside-down.

Chloé doesn’t seem to know what to say—for half a second. "Well, good! At least you know something."

"I know that your father is the mayor of Paris," Ladybug shrugs. She's almost distracted by her crazy feather epaulettes. They keep flickering in her peripheral vision. Next time she dresses up as an akuma victim, she'll skip the epaulettes.

Wait, next time?

Now's not the time to think about that.

"Yeah," Chloé snaps, "and I'm his daughter, so I'm basically royalty—"

The sad thing is, she actually believes that. Ladybug grabs Chloé's shoulder and shoves. Chloé spins around like a top, screaming that she's going to be sick.

"See, here's the thing," Ladybug says, as Chloé slowly comes to a halt. "I know that your father is the mayor of Paris. I just don't care."

Again, Chloé is temporarily stunned. Her blue eyes pop wide open. She's so obviously never been told that being the mayor of Paris isn't actually that big a deal.

"Well—well, Ladybug's going to come rescue me!" Chloé finally splutters. Her face is going a bit purple, and Ladybug's not sure if it's because she's upside-down or because she's angry. "Ladybug always saves me, and you know why? Because we're best friends, that's why! She knows how important I am! She knows she's got to be my friend if she wants to be even a tiny bit cool!"

Oh, the irony. The delicious, delicious irony.

"Ladybug's not going to rescue you." Every word is a treat to say. It's what Ladybug's wanted to say a dozen times over, but has never been able to, because being mean isn't Ladybug's style. The hero of Paris can't run around telling troublemaking brats like Chloé the truth.

But akuma victims can.

Chloé squirms. "Shows how much you know!"

"Oh, I know a lot, Chloé." Ladybug grins, showing far too many teeth. "I know that being the mayor's daughter doesn’t make you special. I know that Adrien Agreste didn't say anything funny outside the school this morning. I know that Ladybug is cool all on her own, and it's you who's got to hang out with her in order to be even a tiny bit cool. And I know that Ladybug's not going to come save you, because she knows what I know."

"And what do you know?" For the first time, Chloé sounds just a little bit afraid.

Ladybug bares her teeth. "She's not your best friend. She's tired of saving your sorry ass over and over again. You're just a nuisance to her—or you were, before you started working with Hawkmoth to create more akumas."

Chloé blinks. "What? What are you talking about?"

"Oh, come on, Chloé. Do you think I'm stupid?" Ladybug pushes Chloé back and lets her swing back and forth like a pendulum. "You spend all your time torturing your classmates. Did you know that you're responsible for 57% of all the akuma attacks in Paris? 57% is a big percent, Chloé."

"Are you insane?" Chloé shrieks. "Like I would work with some gross old man like Hawkmoth! Eew! It's not my fault that everyone's so sensitive! I'm just being honest!"

"Honest," Ladybug snorts, but there's a prickle of doubt in her stomach. Chloé's not a good liar. Everything she says, she means—and when she does lie, she reveals the lie almost immediately.

"Everyone at school is such a crybaby," Chloé continues. She sounds a little nauseous and more than a little scared, but she's sticking with her party line. "It's not my fault that I'm better than them."

Ladybug has to be sure. She has to be sure. She catches Chloé and stares her dead in the eye. "You're not working with Hawkmoth?"

Chloé rolls her eyes, which looks really weird when she's upside-down. "Eew, no. He's, like, a million years old and totally gross. Have you seen that mask he wears? Ugh. It's so unstylish."

The swear word pops out of Ladybug's mouth before she can stop it. Shit. She was wrong. She just kidnapped a girl for no reason. Not good. Not good at all.

Suddenly, there's a thump behind her. Chloé gasps. Ladybug doesn't have to turn around to know what's happened.

"I know you think you've pulled off the purrfect kidnapping," Chat quips, "but you're not as good as you think you are."

Ladybug barely has time to duck before his baton goes whistling over her head.


	7. Chat Noir

This is like no akuma that Chat's fought before. She's fast. And…sparkly. And the feathers on her costume are making his eyes water and his nose itch like crazy, so he's trying not to get too close.

"My partner's not here yet," he quips, even as he claws at the space where her head was, just a second ago, "so you'll have to forgive me for not de-evilizing you right away. But we'll get to it soon, I promise."

The akuma—Marinette, he reminds himself, it's Marinette under that mask—looks terrified and then sets her jaw. "You're not going to get to anything." 

"Look, I know Chloé hurt you yesterday," Chat starts, but Chloé interrupts.

"Hey! I didn't do anything!"

"You obviously did," Chat shoots back, "or else you wouldn’t have been kidnapped!"

"Oh, puh-leez," Chloé says. She's hanging upside-down from the rafters, red-faced and spinning in slow circles, and she's still finding time to be scornful. "Like this is all my fault."

"It is your fault. It's always your fault. You're mean to people, and then they're vulnerable, and then this happens. Every damn time, Chloé! Why won't you learn?" He'd never take this tone with Chloé without a black mask to hide behind. It's nice to say what he really thinks and not have to worry about ruining his oldest friendship.

Chloé makes a disgusted noise. It's amazing how she can be so nice to Adrien, but look at Chat Noir like he's some old gum on the bottom of her shoe. "Well, what about you? Why can't you do anything right?"

"What do you mean?" Chat demands.

"Um, hello?" Chloé rolls her eyes. "You can't even get rid of an akuma without Ladybug!"

Chat's face flames. "It's not my job to get rid of akumas."

"Then why are you here?"

It's only by gritting his teeth that Chat stops himself from swearing. "I'm here to save you and keep the akuma distracted until Ladybug shows up."

"Then save me already, you idiot!"

Has she always been this rude?

"Well, this is touching." Akuma Marinette jerks the thin cord that's suspending Chloé. There's a loud zipping noise, like the one on Ladybug's yo-yo, and suddenly Chloé's on the ground and Akuma Marinette is gone.

"Great." Chloé glares at Chat Noir from the floor.

He looks back at her. He knows he should go after Akuma Marinette, but…

"Aren't you going to help me up?" Chloé demands.

Chat leans on his baton. He's got a couple questions for Miss Bourgeois. "Can't you get up yourself?"

"Ugh!" Chloé stands up and brushes herself off. "Some gentleman you are."

"I'm really more of an alley cat," Chat notes. "You know, the scrappy street fighter with the heart of gold?"

"Heart of hairballs, more like."

That hurts—not because it's mean (though it is), but because Chat knows she'd never talk to Adrien like that. And because he came racing in to save her (again) and she's being an ungrateful little brat (again).

"Do you know who that was?" he asks finally, pointing at the window that Akuma Marinette had disappeared through.

"An akuma. Duh." Chloé pulls her phone out of her pocket. "Wait until Daddy hears about—hey!"

Chat's grabbed her phone. He tosses it up onto the rafters.

"My phone!" Chloé stomps her foot. "Do you know how expensive that phone is?"

"That akuma was Marinette Dupain-Cheng," Chat tells her severely. He's all but shaking his finger in her face, like a parent telling off a toddler. "You made fun of her yesterday, and today, she's another one of Hawkmoth's victims."

Chloé's still staring up at her phone. "Whatever. It's not my fault that Marinette's totally pathetic. Besides, she deserved it. I called dibs on Adrien and she's been trying to steal him for years."

There's a horrible dark feeling in Chat's stomach. "You can't call dibs on people."

She gives him a truly amazing side-eye. "Yes, I can."

"Why?"

"Because."

"Because why?"

"Because," she says again, in a tone that leaves no doubt about how stupid she thinks he is, "I'm me. I'm the only one at school who deserves Adrien, anyways. I mean, come on. You think he's gonna go for someone less hot than him?"

"I don't think he'd go for someone less nice than him," Chat says miserably. God, why did Marinette have to be right? Why couldn't she have just been lying out of pure spite?

"Shows how much you know," Chloé says. She suddenly looks…smug. She likes knowing what Chat doesn't. She likes getting to look down on him.

And he doesn’t like that very much.

He folds his arms. "And what do you know?"

Chloé tosses her long, golden hair. "A whole lot. Like, for instance, I know that Adrien's going to go out with me and not some unpopular loser. You know why?"

He's got a suspicion, but he asks anyways. "Why?"

"Because every other girl at that school—every other girl in Paris—knows that if they so much as look at Adrien Agreste, I'll get them." Chloé juts her hip out and raises her chin proudly. "And why would he go out with a girl who won't even look at him?"

This is it. This is the worst feeling in the world. He thought he'd felt it a dozen times before now—when his mom vanished, when his dad went cold, when birthdays were ignored and Christmases were forgotten—but somehow, this feels worse than all of that, because this is him losing that last shred of hope that he had at least one friend who knew what it was like to be motherless and sheltered and bad at making friends.

He really thought that Chloé was kind to him because she understood what it was like to be him. He really thought that he was just a human disaster, incapable of making friends. And all the while, people had been avoiding him because Chloé had bullied them into literally looking the other way, because she thought she could call dibs on a person the same way she could call dibs on the front seat of the car or the last chocolate donut.

"Did you ever think," he finally says, in a voice that's shaking with fury, "that maybe Adrien wanted friends more than he wanted a girlfriend? Did you ever think that maybe it wasn't your place to make those choices for him?"

Chloé shrugs. She's not sorry in the slightest. "I get what I want. I want Adrien, and I'll get him. It's Marinette's fault that she got in the way. I warned her what I'd have to do if she tried to get close to Adrien, and then she went and got a crush on him."

Chat really, really wants to cataclysm something out of existence right now. "Why is Adrien so important to you?" Please say it's because he's your friend. Please say that you were just trying to help your shy, sheltered friend. Please say that your motivations were good even if your actions were bad.

"He's hot and rich. I'm hot and rich. We're perfect together." Chloé gives him a disdainful look. "Unlike, say, you and Ladybug."

"What does that have to do with—"

"It's about leagues, Chat," Chloé sighs, like she can't believe she has to explain something so simple. "Adrien and I are in the same league, so we need to date each other. You and Ladybug are not in the same league, so you're stupid for thinking that you've even got a chance with her."

It's a low blow that somehow doesn't hurt as much as she probably hopes it will. Chat's a jumble of emotions and he can't possibly feel any worse than he already does. The urge to destroy something is so strong, he feels he's going to explode.

He blinks up at the phone in the rafters and makes a decision. "Cataclysm!"

Dark, dark magic wells up in him. It was kind of scary the first time it happened—scary but exhilarating. It's like every ugly thought he's ever had has taken shape and is pushing him to do something—something dark, and violent, and not-Adrien-y. And sometimes that's what's needed. Sometimes, Adrien's kindness and soft words need to take a backseat to his worst impulses.

Black magic is bubbling around his hand. He leaps up to the rafters and turns Chloé's phone to ash before rushing away through the same window that Akuma Marinette left through. He can hear Chloé screaming at him, but he doesn't care. It's time for him to stop caring about Chloé Bourgeois.


	8. Ladybug

Ladybug's glad she has an escape plan. She zips into an empty classroom, strips off her costume, and detransforms.

"Marinette!" Tikki zips out in front of her face. She looks furious. "That was a terrible thing to do!"

"Not now, Tikki!" Marinette shoves a cookie at the kwami and stuffs the costume into the bottom of her bag, hiding it underneath her schoolbooks. She's got to transform back into Ladybug and zip back home—not only to hide her costume, but to make it look like she's been chasing the "akuma." A few Ladybug sightings will convince Chat Noir that she's taken care of things on her own.

She feels terrible for lying to her partner—especially given that Chloé hadn't been working for Hawkmoth. She just hopes she'll be able to make it up to him.

And she really, really hopes that he hasn't figured out that it was her underneath that glittery mask. That's the kind of betrayal that could break their friendship. Marinette doesn't know how forgiving Chat Noir is, even after hanging out with him as Ladybug and as Marinette for ages. He's got a dark side to him that she'd rather not see directed at her.

Tikki's munching the cookie and glowering at her. You wouldn’t think that such a cute little creature could look so disapproving. "Marinette, that was wrong."

"You think I don't know that?" Marinette snaps, as she zips up her bag and shoulders it. "You think I don't feel bad?"

"I think you enjoyed that a little too much," Tikki grumbles.

Marinette waits until the kwami has finished her cookie and then yells, "Tikki, transformez-moi!"

"Not again!" Tikki screams, but she can't refuse the order. In just a few seconds, Ladybug is back, as lithe and powerful as ever. She leaps out of the classroom just in time to see Chat Noir leaping across the rooftops of Paris.

Time to be brave. Ladybug swings over to him, praying that he doesn't suspect her of betraying his trust. "Minou!"

Chat turns. He looks really upset, but he still tries to smile at her. "Salut, Mi Lady. Did you know there's an akuma running loose?"

"There was," Ladybug quips, "until just a few minutes ago. You missed all the fun, chaton."

His smile is wan. "Yes, well, someone had to help the damsel in distress."

"Damsel in—oh, you must mean Chloé." Ladybug rolls her eyes. "It's always her, isn't it?"

Chat ignores the jibe. "You said that you thought Chloé Bourgeois was working with Hawkmoth."

Is it her imagination, or does Chat Noir's voice get kind of shaky when he says Chloé's name?

Ladybug tries to laugh in a not-nervous way. "I—yeah. That was pretty stupid of me, wasn't it?"

"I still don't think she's working with him," Chat admits, "but I think I know why she's responsible for so many akuma attacks."

"Really?" Could her voice be any squeakier?

"Yeah." Chat looks at her seriously. "I think Chloé's just not a very nice person, and she knows it, and she doesn't care."

He looks devastated. Ladybug doesn’t know why, but she hates to see him like this. "Minou, I could have told you that. Half of Paris could have told you that."

"Actually, 57% of Paris could tell you that."

Oh. Right. She'd told him about the 57% thing two nights ago, atop the Eiffel Tower, over burgers and a milkshake. She can't help wondering if they'll ever do that again.

"Did you get a good look at the akuma?" she blurts. She knows she's asking to be hurt, but she can't help it. She has to know if he knows.

Chat shakes his head. "Sorry, Buginette. I was too busy dealing with Chloé's attitude to get a good look. She had a sparkly broken heart on her front and these weird feathery things?" He waves his hands by his shoulders, trying to gesture "epaulettes."

"Aren't you allergic to feathers?"

"Yeah, that's why I didn't get too close." Chat pauses. "Did you get a look at her? The akuma, I mean."

Ladybug thanks her lucky stars and pats her yo-yo. "Yep. All taken care of. I set her back to school."

He nods. His ring beeps. He looks relieved. "Gotta run. See you later?"

He looks hopeful. That gives Ladybug hope.

"Yeah. Eiffel Tower tonight? You, me, McDonald's, the bright lights of Paris?"

Chat looks like he's going to cry—maybe from relief, maybe from sorrow. "Yeah. Sounds good."

He runs off, and after a moment, Ladybug decides that it's time for her to bug out, too.


	9. Adrien

Chat drops into an alley, detransforms, gives Plagg a wheel of Camembert to keep him quiet, and starts to trudge back to school. He's taking the long way back.

The really, really long way back.

Okay, so he's not going back to school at all. He doesn't want to have to face Chloé or Marinette. He's not sure he could take it. Maybe if he hadn't been so oblivious, Chloé wouldn’t have gotten away with so much and Marinette wouldn't have gotten akumatized. Maybe he could have prevented a lot more people from getting akumatized if he had just seen Chloé for what she was years ago.

God, he's so stupid. Stupid and desperate and pathetic.

The loud zipping of a yo-yo string interrupts his self-pitying thoughts, which is probably for the best. Adrien's heavy heart lifts as Ladybug drops onto the sidewalk, falling into step with him without missing a beat. He knows he shouldn't be this happy to see her, but love doesn’t care about how happy a person should be. Love just makes a person happy, even when it's unrequited.

Not that Ladybug knows that Adrien Agreste is hopelessly in love with her, of course. She has her suspicions about Chat Noir, but Adrien? Adrien's just the nice boy that she drops down to chat with every once in a while—and if he happens to stammer, or blush, or get stars in his eyes, it's just because he's dazzled to be in the presence of the savior of Paris. She's probably used to it.

"You look sad," Ladybug says, without preamble. She doesn't sound pitying, but her round blue eyes have a sympathetic light to them, as if she somehow knows that he's suffering friend trouble.

Adrien decides to match her to-the-point tone. It's easier than going red and fumbling with his words. "I think I need to break up with my oldest friend." He pauses. "And it sucks."

Ladybug's mouth drops open. She tries to speak several times and fails consistently.

Aaand she thinks I'm a horrible person. Adrien hunches his shoulders a little more tightly and concentrates on other things—the thumping of his bag against his hip, the roll of his feet over the pavement.

"That's terrible," Ladybug finally says. "What happened?"

"Basically," Adrien sighs, without looking at her, "I think I've found out that she's a terrible person. I—she didn't—" the words won't come. Why won't the words come? Why can't he be stumbling because he's star-struck and stupidly in love, instead of deeply upset and stupidly in love?

Ladybug doesn't push him for details. She just walks beside him, floating along the dirty pavement in her red-and-black costume. She casts a kind of grace on the street, bestowing glamour on the discarded cigarette butts and flattened wads of old gum.

Yeah, he's got it bad. Always has, always will. He still has this dreamy fantasy that Ladybug will fall in love with him someday, but in his heart of hearts, Adrien knows that Ladybug's one and only love is being a lithe champion of justice and good fortune. Part of him is sad to know that she'll never look his way, and part of him loves her all the more because he knows how seriously she takes her job.

"I'm sorry to hear about your friend," Ladybug says finally. Is it his imagination, or is her voice a bit shaky? "It's always really hard to find out that someone isn't who you thought they were."

"I think I did know, deep down," Adrien says gloomily. "Everyone tried to tell me that she was no good, but I didn't want to believe them. But then I found out that she—she basically—" Come on, words, don't fail me now. Not in front of Ladybug. "She didn't want me to have any other friends. So she…made sure that nobody would want to be friends with me."

Ladybug looks absolutely gutted. "That's awful!"

"Yeah, it is. So now I have to break up with her, and it's gonna suck."

There's a silence that seems to yawn on for ages, and finally Ladybug says, "I'm sorry you've been hurt, Adrien. It's awful when friends hurt each other. Sometimes they don't mean to, but it happens."

She sounds like she's talking from experience. Her voice is shaky and her eyes are shuttered. Adrien wants to reach out and comfort her, but he's not sure how you comfort a superhero. Heck, he's a superhero and he can't even comfort himself.

He has to ask. "Has one of your friends hurt you, Ladybug?"

"No." She gives him a mournful look. "But I think I may have hurt my friend. Someone who means everything to me. I was mad, and I did something really dumb, and…" she trails off and sighs. "I hope he'll talk to me tonight."

Seeing her this upset almost makes Adrien want to forget about friend-dumping Chloé, but that would be taking the easy way out. That would be falling back into old habits just because they were familiar and comfortable. Chloé doesn’t feel any remorse over what she's done. Ladybug does. That's the big difference. In the end, what separates Chloé from her idol isn't the magic suit or the superpowers or the cool yo-yo that can cleanse evil from the world. It's the much more basic stuff. The ability to be nice. The ability to be sorry.

"Sounds like we're both having bad days," Adrien mumbles.

"Yeah." Ladybug's hand finds the back of her neck, almost nervously. "I wish I could help you."

Just hearing her say his name helps. It's a small, stupid thing, but it still helps. It even gives him the courage to say, "Maybe you could help?" He wishes it didn't sound so much like a question.

Ladybug, for some unknown reason, goes bright red and starts to stammer. "Yeah, I could definitely—I mean, I'm sure there's not much I can do, but—I mean—what—what do you…want?"

There's a million responses he could give to that, ranging from romantic to cheeky to downright indelicate. Adrien can see every possible response in his mind's eye. He's got to choose carefully. This could be the start of everything…or the end.

"Would you come visit me sometime?" He finally asks. "I'm stuck at home a lot, and I'm all alone, and—" No, that sounds too pathetic. He stops. Takes a breath. Starts again. "I've lost a friend today, and I don't have very many to spare, so…" Ugh. Pathetic again. He can hear Plagg snickering in his bag through a mouthful of that horrible, smelly cheese.

"That sounds great!" Ladybug blurts. She's still very red, and her arms are sort of…flailing. Adrien's not sure he's ever seen her this uncoordinated. "I mean—" She clasps her hands behind her back. "I'd really like to be your friend, Adrien."

It doesn't take the sting of loss away. But it helps.


	10. Ladybug

That night, after dark, after her homework is done and her parents think she's asleep, Marinette transforms and literally swings through the McDonald's drive-thru. She's almost sick with nerves as she leaps and tumbles across the lacy rooftops of Paris's buildings, blue eyes set on the Eiffel Tower. The warm, greasy bag in her hand feels unusually heavy.

What if it's not enough? All the cheeseburgers and fries in the world can't make up for a friend's betrayal. She's pretty sure that Chat Noir doesn't know it was her under the mask today, but if he does—

Well, she's not sure what she'll do.

She finds Chat Noir sitting atop the Eiffel Tower, legs dangling over the sides. His strange green eyes are unfocused as he stares out over the city. Ladybug can't help but feel a rush of affection for him, despite her trepidation. There's nothing like a friend who's always there—literally and figuratively.

"Salut, chaton." She drops down softly next to him.

He gives her a tired smile. "Mi Lady. Good to see you."

Ladybug puts a hand on his shoulder. She can feel the muscles in his shoulders, tense under the leather plating on his suit. "Are you alright?"

"I had a terrible day, Bugaboo." He heaves a sigh. "And to be honest, I don't really want to talk about it."

This does nothing to assuage Ladybug's lingering fears, but she tries to pretend that everything is fine as she pulls greasy fried food out of the bag. "That's okay, minou. You don't have to talk if you don't want to."

"Thanks." He takes a cheeseburger and unwraps it delicately, trying not to tear the thin paper with his claws.

Ladybug takes a few fortifying bites of her own cheeseburger before saying, "On the bright side, Chloé Bourgeois isn't working with Hawkmoth! That's good, right?"

It's not the most subtle way of bringing up Chloé, but it doesn’t matter.

"Yeah, that's great," Chat Noir mumbles. "She's not evil, she's just terrible."

She has to ask. She has to. "Chat Noir…you don't have to answer if you don't want to, but…why does it make you so sad that Chloé is a mean person?"

At first, she doesn't think he'll answer—but then Chat Noir heaves a sigh that suggests that suggests that he's feeling the weight of years of suffering. "Do you really want the truth, Mi Lady? Even if it means revealing something about myself to you?"

"Yes." After all, she doesn’t know anyone like Chat Noir. It's not as though she'll be seeing the boy underneath the mask at school the next day. And Chat has always wanted to share more about himself. Ladybug has always stopped him, but maybe, just this once, it won't hurt.

He looks almost hopeful. "Really?"

"If something's making you sad, minou, I want to help if I can."

"I'm afraid you've got nothing to do with my sadness, Bugaboo." His smile is weak, but genuine. Ladybug's stomach explodes with relief. He doesn’t know. He really, really doesn't. She hasn't ruined everything with her stupid vendetta and her awful, selfish desire for Chloé to be a villain that needs taking down and locking up.

Chat Noir doesn't seem to notice her relief, which in and of itself is also a relief. He's staring out over Paris's lights again. "You see, Mi Lady…in real life, when I'm not Chat Noir, Chloé is my oldest friend. We've known each other since we were children. I suppose I've always known that she can be mean, but the truth is…well, I don't have very many friends to spare, so I've always treasured the ones I have."

Adrien said something similar just a few hours ago. I haven't got many friends to spare. It's almost like déjà vu. Amazing how Chloé's managed to worm her way into the lives of people who deserve better.

"I was told by a girl I know that Chloé only likes me because I'm hot and rich," Chat continues, "which I thought was crazy. Obviously, I'm very good-looking," he adds, fluttering a hand absently around his face in a halfhearted attempt at a joke, "but I always thought that Chloé liked me for more than that."

This is…this is too much like déjà vu for comfort. This is beyond déjà vu. This is last night's conversation, or at least part of it. This is what Marinette had told Chat Noir about Adrien Agreste.

Chat Noir, meanwhile, is still as glum as ever. "But the girl I know was right. And I was wrong. Chloé knew I didn't have very many friends, but she still threatened all the other girls at school. Said that if they so much as looked at me, she'd make their lives hell. Said that she'd called dibs on me. Didn't even care about what I wanted, or how I felt—she just wanted to have me all to herself, like some kind of pet. She'd probably dump me as soon as someone hotter and richer came along, just like Marinette said she would." He's rambling now, swinging his feet like a little kid even as he says things that no little kid should. "So now I have to break up with my oldest friend, and it's going to suck. Did you know that I used to think she was just kind of shy? That she just didn't know how to be around people her own age, so she said a lot of dumb stuff that she didn't really mean? God, I'm so stupid."

Every cell in Ladybug's body seems to be shaking. She's nervous and excited and overjoyed and hopeful and so, so scared.

And Chat Noir hasn't even noticed. Of course he hasn't. He's as oblivious as she is. The two of them are just big, dumb, oblivious idiots. "Anyways, that's why I'm all upset over Chloé. Sorry to dump all this on you; I know none of this really matters to you—" And then he looks up, and he sees her face, and he freezes.

Ladybug doesn’t know what she looks like. She doesn’t know if she's even breathing anymore. All she knows is that she needs to choose her next sentence carefully. This could be the end of everything…and the start of something amazing.

"Mi Lady? Are you okay?"

Something jolts inside Ladybug's chest, like an electric shock. And suddenly, she's smiling—smiling like she didn't know she could, like she never has before. She might even be crying, a little bit, and she's not sure if it's from joy or confusion or just laughter over how ridiculously blind she's been all these years.

"I'm fine, chaton," she manages. She doesn't know what she's going to say next or where this is going, but with a little luck, she'll be able to go there with the boy who's been beside her for years.

It's a wonderful thought.


End file.
